Benefits of Reading 2- Ideas and Activities

Reading in the womb

It is never too early to begin reading to your child. Even reading whilst the child is in the womb has been proven to have significant benefits to their abilities. The University of Florida found that a Foetus between the 28^th and 34^th weeks of pregnancy could remember familiar nursery rhymes. These findings suggest that babies are much more susceptible to being influenced by their surroundings before birth than previously thought.

There are many different ways you can stimulate your baby whilst they are in the womb:

• Sharing music and play some classical songs while allowing your child to listen.
• Read simple stories or tell your child what has been happening that day.
• Sing simple songs and nursery rhymes.
• Talk to your child and allow them to hear different familiar voices; siblings; Aunt Kate; Uncle Robert; Dad and Mum.

Reading with babies

According to The American Academy of Pediatrics reading is an essential part of quality development. It stimulates imagination, creativity and improves communication skills. It also introduces children to numbers, letters, colours, shapes and other topics.  This is the age when a two way interaction between parent and child can begin to form.

• Children love routine, so making a set time to read with your child is vital. This will set the foundation for your child to enjoy reading right the way through childhood.
• Your child won’t understand everything that you are saying but by reading together and looking at the books, your child will start to recognize every day words.
• Choose brightly coloured books with simple pictures. You don’t want to overload your child with too much information; allow them to use their own creativity. As you read with your child, point to pictures, change the sound of your voice to suit different characters and allow your child time on each page. Interactive books that you can touch and feel are great for children to develop their senses.
• Reciting nursery rhymes and dancing is also a great way to stimulate creativity and imagination. Don’t fall into the trap of just reading them out to your child, rather, be energetic, smile and bring the songs and stories to life. Your child will react to your body language so remember to enjoy this moment yourself.
• Using your child’s toys to make up stories also breeds familiarity and allows the children to continue their creativity when you stop reading.

Reading with young children

Between the ages of 2 and 3 children see a huge development in language and vocabulary skills. In fact according to Barbara Zurer Pearson, author of “Raising a bilingual child”, children are even capable of distinguishing between languages, so the more languages they are surrounded by the better. This is also a great age for sharing reading as children become more responsive. There are many phonics games that you can play at this age and these can be found on our videos page on facebook as well as on our phonics page within the blog. In terms of just reading there are many ways to share:

• Choose books with repetition- Children love knowing what’s coming next and love repeating phrases they are familiar with. It brings them into the story and enables them to join in without being able to read themselves.
• Act out the story with your child- Once you finish reading a story and the child is familiar with it, act it out. You could build a castle out of bed sheets, or houses made of sticks and really get your child living the story.
• Ask children to draw their favourite character from the story- Discuss what clues from the story help describe the character. You could even ask the children to make up a new character for the story.
• Hot seat- Let children read their favourite book and then put them in the hot seat. They can choose their favourtie character before being interviewed on their role in the story. Swap roles and let them ask you as well.
• Make up a story together- With your child verbally make up a story together. You could take this one further and write captions and let your child illustrate; creating your own story book together.
• Make a photo story- Take a trip with your child and take photos together. Allow your child to create sentences about what you are doing in each photo. With more advanced learners you could write a joint diary writing down how you felt at different parts of the day. This also allows the children to empathise with your feelings and perspectives as well.
• Look for books together- One of the most overlooked and important parts of reading, is going to find books together; ones that you can both share.
• Hidden messages- This is a fun way to get your child to enjoy reading. Write them special notes and leave them round the house. Reward them for finding them, “ask Mum for a cookie”.
• Treasure hunts- Children love going on treasure hunts. Dress up as pirates for the day and set up an obstacle course. Take children round the house following clues to find the treasure.
• Role play- Sit and have tea with your child’s dolls, or act out a World Cup final. Find out what your child enjoys and make up a story with them. You can either improvise or make up the story first and then act it out.
• Share the reading load- If your child is beginning to read independently, it can seem daunting to have to read a whole book or even a whole page so break it up. Read one line each and act like you are struggling. Ask for help rather than demand your child reads. Let your child know that even adults struggle at times and it is nothing to be ashamed of.

The most important part of shared reading is to look for the things that your child enjoys the most. Not all of these ideas will work for every child.  There are many ways to peak a child’s interest. Try to pick ideas that share the reading experience and you will both be much happier for it.

For more information on the benefits of reading, please take a look at our earlier post The Benefits of Reading With Children

 

The benefits of reading with children

One of the easiest and often most overlooked aspects of child development is simply just taking the time to sit and read together; the emphasis lying with the word “together”. Reading should be a shared experience and not just one way. When we say one way we mean either by the parent reading and the child listening, or for older children, the child reading and the parent listening. The best way to help children to develop, no matter how good they are at reading, is to read with them and share the enjoyment. Children want to share everything they do and when they know that their parents and teachers have time to listen to them, it motivates them to want to read more.  In this blog piece we will outline the benefits of reading for children and in the next addition we will look at ways to share reading experiences and make reading more fun than it already is.

Reading is not just for your child: reading is an opportunity for parents to slow down and have some personal time with their children. In this day and age and especially as children get older, it is harder to find one on one time, so it is important to schedule some time in and what could be more personal than cuddling up with a good story?

Reading is fundamental to academic development: Reading with children is the easiest way for them to become smarter without having to push them. Reading can start from any age and some studies have shown that even reading to the child in the womb can have a positive effect on the child’s development. Good reading is the basis for all educational progression. If a child is a good reader they are able to access every part of not only the curriculum, but also the world around them.

Moral building: Reading books can help children to relate to others more personally. By seeing how characters react to each other within stories children learn what is right and wrong. As well as this children gain vital sharing skills from just reading with family members.

Logical thinking and predictive skills: Through books children begin to see patterns in language and plots. They will begin to link sequences of events and be better at relating to real life experiences. Reading also breeds creativity and good readers tend to be good writers too.

Learning about themselves: Books nowadays are tailored to the milestones in young children’s lives. For example young learner books might be related to sharing or role playing, whereas a child of say five or six might be reading about how to fit into a new school. They offer valuable lessons and reinforcement for parents when discussing key issues affecting the children at different stages of life.

Better concentration: Reading has also been linked to better concentration and attention skills. Children with better reading skills have been shown to have better retention rates and generally perform better at tasks requiring high concentration.

 

For ideas and activities on how to share reading, please take a look at The Benefits of Reading 2- Ideas and activities.